On the tram, Jacobson got a new idea for his Bottomless Pit. He would
have preferred to get off at the nearest stop and take another tram back
home, to see on the board what his idea was worth. But that was out of
the question: he couldnít keep thirty children waiting for nothing.
For the rest of the ride, and during his walk to
the school, Jacobson tried to visualize the effects of his idea. He couldnít
do it blind; the Bottomless Pit was too complicated. Perhaps, at the school,
before the games started, he could find a moment to set up the position.
If some of the players were watching, he would explain what he was trying
to do. "Itís not correct yet," he would say, "but this is the idea. Mate
in nineteen. The mate itself is easy, but Black is going to delay it. He
can interpose a pawn, and this one too and one more; a knight, and this
knight too. Now a rook, and another one, the queen, and even the bishop:
nine sacrifices, all on the same square. And now, finally, White can mate,
you see? Beautiful, isnít it? And on the tram, on my way over here..."
No, he would rather say: "On my walk over here." On the tram, he could
have been looking at a pocket chess set. What he really had to get across
was that such an idea could grab hold of you just as well when there was
no chess board around.

He hadnít been there in thirty years, but those thirty years were erased
when he stood in the dark granite entrance hall and breathed its odor:
Wilhelmus Lyceum. He could almost feel his book bag under his arm.
The hall was like an echoing swimming pool. Students
were running in all directions, some with their faces painted as cats or
mice, bumping into each other and into him without looking where they were
going.
No one seemed to have been assigned to meet him.
On a pillar, he noticed a hand-painted poster, announcing:

Eleven names were listed.
Jacobson stood waiting by the pillar. Nothing happened.
The clock in the entrance hall showed four minutes to three, one minute
to three. It should have started at three. If nobody showed up by
then, he would go home, no excuses.
A boy, who was also a cat or a mouse, came running
toward him.
"Are you grandmaster Jacobson?"
"Yes?"
"Jos is finishing up in the Ping-Pong room. Heíll
be right there."
Jos, that had to be Jos Webster, the former classmate
who had invited him. Webster had been a phenomenon, a chubby school clown
with coke-bottle glasses whose speech was so affected that he was once
expelled from class just for that. At the same time he was one of the best
table tennis players in the Netherlands. Back then, he was already playing
on the Dutch national team, and for years to come Jacobson had continued
to find his results in the newspapers. Webster wasónot counting Peltz,
of courseóthe best-known sports figure Wilhelmus had ever produced. It
seemed strange that someone like that would ever have busied himself with
anything else but table tennis and being eccentric, but now he was a classics
teacher and the assistant principal of their old school.
There had been no room in the schoolís budget for
an honorarium. Playing simuls for free was against Jacobsonís principles
as a professional, but he had agreed to come: you had to know when to set
your principles aside. It was at Wilhelmus that he had become a chess player;
it was only fair for him to pass on some of his love and knowledge to a
new generation.
In light of this, eleven participants was disappointing.
"Isnít it great about Peltz?" said the painted boy.
Jacobson nodded.
"Is he going to be world champion?"
"Who knows."
"No, but seriously? What do you think?"
"Speculating is not very..." Jacobson started saying,
but suddenly he felt irritated by the righteousness of the answer he invariably
gave anybody and everybody who wanted to talk chess with him during the
last few weeks.
He nodded. "Yes, heíll beat Neishtadt. Peltz is
going to be world champion."
"Youíre kidding! Jesus! World champion! Wasnít it
great, that last game? The Brisbane Bombshell!"
"Will you be playing in the simul?" Jacobson asked.
"No way," said the boy, laughing in mock panic.
"Chess is too hard for me."
Suddenly a little man with a red beard stood in
front of Jacobson and kissed him on both cheeks.
"Daantje Jacobson? Jesus, man, have you gotten ugly!"

Music was booming in the cafeteria. There was no indication of any chess
simul, not a single board upon which he might have set up his Bottomless
Pit. He had expected to see a neat rectangle of tables, with boards and
pieces already set up, participants and spectators looking forward to his
arrival.
During his own school years Wilhelmus already had
a more liberal reputation than other schools, but what Jacobson was seeing
now shocked him. A girl no older than fourteen was stamping out her cigarette
on the floor, which was littered with plastic cups, pieces and wads of
paper, cigarette butts; a fallen streamer was floating in a puddle of coke.
The most remarkable thing about a couple of bulging trashcans was that
something had occasionally been thrown into them. What a way to host someone
they thought was a grandmaster. He really should turn around and get out.
This was hallowed groundóPeltz had played chess here; over there,
by the window overlooking the courtyard, Jacobson had won his unforgettable
game against him.
Now, in the same spot, stood a table covered with
little jars of makeup; a girl was painting another girlís face. A sign
read: BE A WILHELMOUSE TOO - 1 GUILDER.
So they were mice.
But where were the chess players?
Suddenly the music stopped, and in the midst of
the resulting howls of protest Webster came and stood next to Jacobson,
and shouted: "Kids, kids, please be quiet for a moment! Grandmaster Jacobson
has arrived, the chess match is about to start. Who will help arrange the
tables? Will someone please go and get the boards and pieces?"
From the audience came whistles, and shouts of "We
want disco!" No one came forward, and Webster didnít look as if he had
expected it either. "The chess club here died several years ago," he said
to Jacobson, with an apologetic laugh. "I hadnít told you?"
Webster started moving tables himself. Only one
fragile-looking boy, his serious expression untouched by the mouse-paint,
helped him set up the rectangle. Jacobson almost lent a helping hand himself.
But there was a limit.
When Webster walked out of the cafeteria the mousy
little fellow followed him; a moment later they returned with the boards
and pieces and proceeded to set them up.
And now Jacobson could really smell the old school.
These were the very boards and pieces they had used in his day. Among them
was perhaps the same black queen that Peltz had blundered in their historic
game. Twelve-year-old against eighteen-year-old, don't miss it! And Japie
Peltz had not been your average twelve-year-old either; Jacobson was already
letting him play on the school team, second board, right behind himself.
That little boy actually had a chance to win the school championship; their
game would be the deciding one. In those days chess really meant something
at Wilhelmus. At home, Jacobson had made signs, one saying PELTZ
1C and the other JACOBSON 6b,
which he had placed on the game table. At least twenty spectators had shown
up, and a couple of teachers too. Jacobson hadnít needed more than a draw,
but it was out of the question that he, a three-time school champion, someone
who already played for his club in the national team championship, would
play for a draw against a twelve-year-old, no matter how unquestionable
his talent.
He could still see the Japie Peltz of that game:
a little guy you could almost blow over, uncapping and recapping his fountain
pen at every move and giving off a slightly musty smell, from his fatherís
pet shop.
He and Peltz had probably been the only ones who
realized that "playing for a draw" was always out of the question. Even
with Black, Peltz had put him under pressure right from the opening, and
with matter-of-fact, powerful play obtained a winning position.
Then he had hung his queen. Jacobson had barely
been able to suppress a sigh of relief, and had immediately aligned himself
with the prevailing view among the spectators: that the little guy had
put up a good fight, but that in the end something like this was bound
to happen. Peltz had resigned immediately and walked away, his eyes misty;
Jacobson was school champion for the fourth consecutive time. He had written
a story for the school newspaper with the headline JAAP
PELTZ: A FUTURE CHESS MASTER? and proposed a blitz rematch.
Peltz had declined: his homework took precedence.
It remained the only game Jacobson had won against
Peltz, but: he had also never lost against him. During Peltzís early years,
they had played a few more games against each other, all draws. After that,
Peltz had left him far behind, too far to be able to take revenge. There
was something mythical about it: the son who has become strong enough to
defeat the father is then forever separated from his father.
The score Jacobson - Peltz would be 1-0 forever.

In the end, twelve students and three teachers were seated behind the
twenty-four chess boards. Pretending to have succeeded in obtaining silence,
Webster spoke a word of welcome.
"No anniversary of the school that has produced
Jaap Peltz," he said, "should be without a chess simul. Therefore I have
invited the well-known chess columnist of the Amsterdam Tribune, the greatest
chess player ever among my classmates, grandmaster Daniel Jacobson!"
The chess players clapped. Jacobson quickly explained
the simul rules and began. Webster himself played too.
After only a few moves it became clear that Wilhelmus
was no longer any good. The spirit of Peltz, or his own for that matter,
no longer lived here. Even without music, the racket he had to play in
was unbearable. A simul against weak opponents was strictly a matter of
experience, but the lack of respect revealed by the noise upset Jacobson.
He decided to keep in his pocket the copy of his book "My Chess Board is
Alive," which he had brought along to give to the best player.
But he began to feel that it would be especially
sad for himself if the simul were over in a half hour, and without going
so far as to play badly on purpose he tried to avoid situations in which
his opponents could blunder too easily.
Perhaps because he was giving that too much attention,
he made a blunder himself, hanging a piece against one of the teachers.
It was just a Fingerfehler, a transposition of moves, the type of blunder
you made precisely because you were a strong player. But gone was
gone. The teacher was not to be fooled, and after winning all the other
games, Jacobson resigned.
Webster, who amid general hilarity had been the
first to be mated after only five minutes and had thereupon abruptly disappeared,
was suddenly back again. With an audience of only Jacobson, the winning
teacher, and the mousy little fellow who had helped with the boards, he
called Jacobsonís score of 14-1 phenomenal, and handed him a bottle of
whiskey.
"Now you have to play Ping-Pong with me," he said.

Jacobson found himself in the gym, standing behind a Ping-Pong table
with a paddle in his hand. On benches, all around, about a hundred students
were waiting in relatively orderly fashion.
"This is my ex-classmate, chess grandmaster Jacobson,"
Webster shouted. "He has just won all the games in the simul." This was
greeted by loud cheers and whistles; involuntarily, Jacobson looked to
see if the teacher who had won was there also.
"So we have to teach him a lesson. Shall I do it?"
"Yeah!" yelled the crowd.
"Five games, to eleven!" shouted Webster.
In the old days, Jacobson had sometimes watched
Webster play for five guilders with a 19-0 handicap. He had practically
always won. And that was somebody whose 21-3 losses against Chinese you
could find in the papers!
Webster took a Ping-Pong paddle the size of a checkers
man from his pocket, and served. Automatically, Jacobson returned a few
balls; a moment later, he had lost by 11-1. The fact that Webster was playing
with such a tiny paddle didnít seem to make any difference at all. In the
following games, Webster used a baseball bat, a badminton racket, and a
gong. He won everything. In the game with the gong, Jacobson had trouble
keeping a straight face, but Webster played with grim determination, and
it was amazing what he was still capable of.
"And now," said Webster, "chess." He held up a chess
boardóthe audience roared.
"No no," Jacobson laughed. This really hurt his
dignity. Would Peltz put up with something like that? At least two kids
were taking pictures; imagine such a picture ending up in a chess magazine.
Webster laughed and served, holding the chess board
by a corner.
He is letting me win, Jacobson thought when he found
himself ahead by 10-8. A moment later he had lost by 12-10.
"Mate!" shouted Webster.

He was already at the front door, never again to set foot in Wilhelmus.
But a small boy approached him.
"Mister Jacobson, may I ask you something?"
The boy hemmed and hawed, so shy he was barely intelligible.
"May I challenge you to a correspondence game?"
"No," said Jacobson.
In the boyís eyes there was such shocked disappointment,
already mixed with resignation, that Jacobson felt bad about his curt reaction.
"I donít have enough time," he said. "People often ask me; I am a professional
chess player, but if I would agree to play every..."
"I see," said the boy. "I thought... My father said..."
Jacobson recognized him. It was the mousy little
kid who had helped with the boards. There he stood, his transparent face
awe-struck and twitching as he confronted grandmaster Jacobson.
"You were one of the players, werenít you?"
"Yes, sir. You won."
"Which game were you?"
"Kingís Indian. You got your knight to d5 and then
I could hardly do anything anymore."
Jacobson remembered the game: it was the only one
that had even resembled a chess game. For a while, the kid had followed
a well-known game by Peltz, developed his pieces neatly, made no glaring
mistakes, but then let himself be reeled in without a fight. He had resigned
appropriately, but surprisingly early for someone of his strength.
"I would always add a self-addressed envelope and
a stamp. That way it wonít cost you anything."
That way it wonít cost me anything! Jacobson bristled
at the thought. The eternal naiveté of the amateur who thought that
you were already making enough if it didnít cost you anything!
"All right then," he said to his utter amazement.
"Really?" said the boy. An incredulous, joyful expression
transformed the face.
"In that case, may I play with White? Iíll send
you my first move right away. Thank you very much!"

At the tram stop, Jacobson realized that he had left his bottle of whiskey
at the table tennis scene. What a waste of an afternoon. How could he possibly
have agreed to this correspondence game? Because there had been a flash
in which he had seen the boy as a reincarnation of Japie Peltz, age twelve?
Certainly not because of the talent.
But soon Jacobson remembered his idea for the Bottomless
Pit, and his irritation dissolved. He longed to be home, to set up the
position, see if it worked, and so let as many hours pass as he wanted.

It did not work, which didnít surprise Jacobson. With interruptions,
he had already spent a year on his Bottomless Pit. An idea for a beautiful
chess problem would come to you in a flash; a position that would show
what you wanted could be set up in a quarter of an hour, but it could take
months to actually make such an idea work correctly. The pieces were stubborn
opponents. Certainly in the Bottomless Pit, which had to couple the brute
force of a harvesting machine with the precision of a ladiesí watch.
There was a certain urgency. In five months entries
had to be submitted for the World Composition Tournament. If the Bottomless
Pit was ready in time, and if it were to be declared the winner in the
more-mover section, then Jacobson would beóin a way that he would never
take too seriously of course, but even soóthen he would be world champion.

When Jacobson, a few days after his Wilhelmus visit, received a letter
addressed to IM Jacobson, in which the writer said his name was
Pepijn de Jong, his age twelve and his first move e2-e4, he had completely
forgotten about the correspondence game.
His first reaction was to propose a draw, and then,
rejecting that as childish, to write that pressure of work forced him to
abandon the idea after all.
Even more than Peltz, he was a professional. Whoever
wanted to avail himself of his chess expertise had to pay for it. Articles,
lectures, analyses, access to his archives, simuls, it all came at a price.
At one time he had determined a rate for correspondence games: fifteen
guilders a move.
Incidentally, Pepijn had kept his word. He had enclosed
a self-addressed return envelope, and a self-made notation sheet on which
he had filled in, for White P. de Jong, for Black IM D. Jacobson,
and for the first move e2-e4. He had also added two drawings, one
an original and the other a copy, of a player sitting behind a chess board
on which e2-e4 has been played and from whose head emanated a balloon with
the words: My move is... says IM Jacobson. Coming from a twelve-year-old it was not altogether
without talent.
Could he disappoint such a child? A small boy who
had been the only one to help set up the chess boards? Who had played over
at least one of Peltzís games? Whose love of chess could be crucially stimulated
by a correspondence game against a real master?
And then that IM Jacobson. By using his real
title, Pepijn touched on a sore point, but also showed that he was no stranger
to the world of chess. The ordinary public thought that anybody who could
think three moves ahead, or was able to play no fewer than twenty children
simultaneously, had to be a grandmaster. By the skin of his teeth Jacobson
had managed to earn the International Master title, but he was so consistently
called grandmaster, by the editors of his newspaper, simul organizers,
and the general public, that he had given up correcting everyone. Anyway,
whoever called him grandmaster probably had something in mind that was
much inferior to the IM title he really possessed. "Grandmaster" had become
a household term, something like "genius," a word used to express awe in
general. People had no clue that it was an official title.
Only in that little boy was the flame of Wilhelmus
chess still flickering!
Jacobson chose the Sicilian, the best opening for
Black against 1.e2-e4 to defeat a weak opponent quickly. He couldnít quite
bring himself to filling in "c7-c5" on Pepijnís dots, and he wrote his
move on a postcard. Drawings and form he threw in the wastebasket.
He mailed his move that same day, and forgot about
the correspondence game again.

"The Brisbane Bombshell" may have been a vulgar sports slogan designed
to allow a public that didnít even know how the pieces moved to gloat over
Peltzís successesóbut it was definitely on target. Chess players themselves
were talking about the Brisbane Bombshell, and although Jacobson would
never call it that in writing, at times the term would come to mind when
he happened to be thinking of Peltzís miracle move.
In Brisbane, Australia, not long before Jacobsonís
simul at Wilhelmus, Jaap Peltz, at forty-two, had achieved the biggest
success of his life by winning his match against Feoktistov and becoming
the challenger of world champion Neishtadt. It was a completely unexpected
and somewhat undeserved victory, but mostly what was still creating a buzz
in the chess world was the way Peltz had pulled it off.
With the score even, Peltz had won the last game,
with Black no less, thanks to an extremely bold pawn sacrifice in the early
opening: 8...d5!óprecisely the move that White had been playing to prevent.
It was the Novelty of the Century; in the fifty years that this position
had occurred in games, no one, from club player to the world champion,
had even considered that d5 might be possible. It was as if Peltz had demonstrated
that no parachute was needed to jump out of an airplane.
Immediately after the sacrifice, Feoktistov could
have forced a dead-drawn ending, but he hadnít, perhaps because with White
he thought that would have been too much honor for Peltz. Instead, he had
played to keep the pawn, and that had proven to be a mistake. Peltz had
played around that pawn as if it were an old chairóhe had paralyzed and
humiliated Feoktistov, and won the most beautiful and important game of
his life.
Almost a month had passed since that game, and no
one had discovered anything better for White than the drawing line. That
was puzzling: if Black, after eight natural moves by White, could at least
equalize in such a bold way, something was wrong with the game of chess.
Jacobson too had stared for hours at Peltzís pawn
sacrifice, without finding a refutation. It must have been the same for
chess players the world over. No one had found anything yet; at least no
one had published anything.
Jacobson was wondering who actually had come up
with this Brisbane Bombshell. Imagination and daring were anything but
characteristic of Peltzís game. It had to be Fajnman, a Russian who had
immigrated to the Netherlands and had been working for Peltz for years.
Though Fajnman had never won any tournaments, he was famous for his brilliant
and bizarre ideas. He looked the part, too: like the crazy scientist in
a comic strip.
Peltz had done the right thing: Fajnman added something
to his game that he lacked himself: the artistic element.

At the press conference Peltz had given at Schiphol Airport upon his
return, no one came away any wiser. More than ever, Jacobson was struck
by Peltzís air of insignificance. At the long table, where he sat with
Fajnman, his other seconds Loyd and Lindgren, and his business manager
Quinten de Jong, any outsider without hesitation would have pointed at
Peltz as the person who didnít belong. The chess players looked like chess
players, Peltz like the mayor of a small town. A reception on that scale
was new to him, but he showed no trace of nerves or excitementówith superior
humility the little bourgeois faced the roomful of reporters, photographers,
and television cameras, all the while greeting acquaintances with brief,
stiff nods. Jacobson got one too, but in that nod there was the special
aloofness of their 1-0.
With his characteristic incapability of self-glorification,
Peltz, his eyebrows raised in perpetual mild surprise, described his victory
over Feoktistov in terms of chance. What was measured in a chess match
wasnít who was the better player but who scored the most points; in Brisbane,
Feoktistov had certainly not played any worse than he had.
In various terms, Peltz was asked whether he was
going to be world champion. In equally varied terms, he said that he hoped
so, that Neishtadt was stronger on paper, but that that was no more than
one indication of the possible outcome. Even if Neishtadt had four sides
of the die and he only two, it remained a die, and one of his sides could
come up.
It was interesting that only the regular journalists
asked questions while the chess journalists kept quiet. Most of them were
Peltzís personal acquaintances; of course every one of them was hoping
to get the exclusive story of the Brisbane Bombshell from him personally.
Besides, you didnít ask a grandmaster about his opening secrets, certainly
not in public.
But suddenly a young journalist, not a chess player,
asked the question that was on everybodyís lips.
"Mister Peltz, this Brisbane Bombshell, was it actually
bluff?"
It was as if someone had asked the Queen her bra
size. After a bewildered silence, the entire audience burst out laughing,
even Peltz. He leaned over toward Fajnman, evidently to translate the question,
because Fajnman also broke into a whinny. The interviewer himself joined
in the laughter, turning beet-red. It took at least a minute before it
was quiet enough for an answer.
"Bluffing is impossible in chess," said Peltz. "All
the information is visible. You canít pretend to have a possibility if
you donít have it."
You could always count on Peltz for a sobering thought,
but this was nonsense. Of course you could bluff in chess; even he knew
that. You could speculate that the opponent would not use his information
correctly; make him believe that you had possibilities you didnít really
have. And although it didnít fit Peltzís profile at all, Jacobson believed
more and more strongly that the Brisbane Bombshell had been precisely that:
pure bluff.

It was as if a chess spirit had floated above the Wilhelmus Lyceum,
knowing that a boy was there who loved chess and had to be imbued with
talent, and that spirit had blundered. It simply didnít make sense: Japie
Peltz of the pet shop a grandmaster, one step away from the world championshipóand
he, the son of writers, sitting there with a little notebook in his hand,
listening to what Japie had to say. It was Jacobson who was the
chess player; the moment was still with him when, seeing two boys playing
chess, there had been an explosion of certainty that he wanted that too,
always, whatever it would turn out to be. And when the existence of Peltz,
so close to him, had made it clear early on that he had no talentóthen
so be it, no talent. There were books to write, archives to maintain, endgames
to research, problems to compose. A real chess player loved chessóPeltz
was Dr. Peltz, economist, author of a series of widely used school books,
married young and living in a suburb with his wife and four ugly daughters;
a man cut out for train passes and lunch boxes. No Bottomless Pits for
Peltz.
Even if Peltz could play chess ten times better
than he, Jacobson was a thousand times more the chess player.

Composing chess problems had proved far more addictive even than playing
games. The name Bottomless Pit had come to Jacobson before he realized
its double meaning: the great Chess Piece Monster gobbled up all his time.
Time streamed into his head and evaporated there by the tankload. But no
matter: this was the real chess, not White against Black, but the artist
against his medium, against both White and Black together. And even if
people like Peltz had no idea what you were doing, the beauty you were
chasing after, and sometimes created, held a truth that would survive all
of his games.
Jacobson seldom played games anymore. Only Nardus
stopped by from time to time to get some columns out of his archive and
to play blitz. He always brought snacks, but he refused to look at the
Bottomless Pit.
During those blitz games, it was almost with sorrow
that Jacobson looked at his pieces. A great master had once said that the
chess pieces are alive with desires and feelings. In the games of Neishtadt
and Feoktistov, even in those of Peltz, in the Bottomless Pit, that was
indeed true, but in his games against Nardus they were washed out like
old animals.
At times Jacobson thought, I play just well enough
to see that Iím no good. I am the worst chess player who ever loved chess
this much.

Now and then Nardus hosted a kind of chess salon, afternoons when Peltz
showed his latest games to a group of chess acquaintances, most of them
journalists. The tacit understanding was that Peltzís views could be published:
this was his way of propagating his own commentary on his games. He himself
never wrote about chess.
Sitting among Nardus, Jacobson, sometimes Fajnman,
Quinten de Jong, Loyd and Lindgren when they werenít out of the country,
and a small number of other privileged insiders, there was Peltz with his
birdlike perch, his spry countenance, his decency, looking like
a lost citizen from the real world. He confirmed that impression by treating
the suggestions of Quinten, who was no more than your everyday amateur
player, just as seriously as those of the attending masters and grandmasters.
Quinten also seemed out of place; a broadly built, cigar-smoking individual
most often dressed in a three-piece suit, bearing no trace at all of his
early career as a ballet dancer. These days he had a talent agency, and,
attracted by the supposed mystique that shrouded chess, had zoomed in on
Peltz. Perhaps Peltz recognized in him a brother non-chessplayer and looked
to him for support, but Jacobson thought it was folly to let such a character
sit with the group.
Going over the Brisbane games, everyone held their
breath at the last one, that of the Bomb. Without blinking an eye, Peltz
played beyond it, and at the seventeenth move said: "Is it OK with you
all if we start here?"
"Mister Peltz," said Nardus, "was that Bomb actually
bluff?"
Peltz gave a quick smile and said, "Bishop e2 doesnít
work here, Black takes on f2."
On his walk home after such afternoons, Jacobson
felt dizzy at the thought of that little guyís speed and lucidity. None
of the insights were in themselves beyond him, but the self-evidence with
which Peltz would distill a plan or a move out of all those divergent implications
of a position boggled the mind. He didnít calculate, he knew; chess was
his mother tongue.
But he wasnít going to be world champion. In light
of chess history, Peltz was no more than an amusing late bloomer whose
qualification for a world championship match was more than he deserved.
Neishtadt was much too strong for him.
During one of those sessions, when it came up that
Jacobson and Peltz had gone to school together, Jacobson mentioned their
old game and their 1-0 score. He noticed a slight irritation in Peltz that
passed immediately, and realized he had committed an indiscretion by mentioning
the old score that could never be settled now.
The reprimand had followed immediately. To Jacobsonís
astonishment, Peltz promptly showed the old game at dictation speed. Jacobson
seemed to be seeing it for the first time; with Peltz moving the pieces,
and masters and grandmasters for an audience, he was struck by the crookedness,
the stupidity, the horrible talentlessness of his own play; especially
compared to the 12-year-old Peltzís crystal-clear effectiveness.
Nardus had asked if he could publish the game, and,
after a quick glance at Jacobson, Peltz had shaken his head and said, "That
remains our game, doesnít it, Daan?"
Jacobson stood in such awe of Peltz the chess player
that it took days before it dawned on him what it meant that Peltz had
been able to show that game on command. A grandmaster of his caliber knew
thousands of games by heart, but most likely not a thirty-year-old school
championship game. He must have gone over that game oftenóhe was one step
away from the world title but still couldnít bear having blown that school
championship.
Oh, Jacobson would have gladly remained eighteen
forever so Peltz would be always twelve: a small boy in tears who had found
out that you couldnít overthrow the established order just like that.

Every time Pepijn sent a move, Jacobson remembered the correspondence
game again. He received an address change from someone whose profession
was "pawn" and who announced his move from d2 to d4; a watercolor representing
the display window of a toy shop, inside which, if you looked closely,
you could see a miniature chess board showing the new position; a series
of Polaroid photos on which Pepijn lugged a pawn across a giant chess board
in a park. In a package delivered in his absence, which Jacobson had to
pick up at the post office, was a real chess knight, its head fitted onto
the base with a piece of paper on which he found, not until several minutes
later, the words: "Iím going from d4 to b5 all in one piece."
Without a doubt Pepijn was a nice, sensitive boy
who thought he was pleasing Jabobson with those surprise gifts. But they
irritated him. He had agreed to a game of chess, not asked to peek into
a childís soul.
Early December, toward Saint Nicholas day, Jacobson
received a marzipan chess board with an arrow pointing from b5 to a3. "May
this put you in a marzipensive mood," wrote Pepijn.
Jacobson immediately ate the board.
The game itself also irritated him. After a few
moves it had dawned on himóstupid klutz that he wasóthat he shouldnít have
played the Sicilian. Instead, it would have been better to leave theory
as quickly as possible. Now it was too late. A correspondence game was
no ordinary game; Pepijn could choose the sharpest systems and look them
up in books. For the time being an old newspaper would suffice, for Pepijn
was boldly following the path that led to the Brisbane Bombshell. And now,
after the marzipan move, Jacobson had to decide whether, just like Peltz
against Feoktistov, he would dare to play 8...d5.
That was remarkable indeed.
It was out of the question that Pepijn was repeating
the moves of the worldís most talked-about game by accident. True, he was
following the loser, but if Jacobson now played the Bomb, how would he
respond if Pepijn chose the drawing line that Feoktistov had spurned? Simple:
that variation was a draw between grandmasters; with his superior technique,
and playing against a schoolboy, Jacobson would have no trouble winning
precisely such an even endgame.
He had to laugh at himself: what a chess player
he was. Here he was worrying about winning a game he hadnít wanted to play
in the first place! If Pepijn chose the drawing line he could have his
draw. Jacobson would send him a copy of his own column from the Amsterdam
Tribune with that variation, and a draw offer. Then the boy would have
to be really impertinent to want to continue.
Anyhow, he couldnít let a schoolboy call his bluff,
and he played the Bomb. There was some pleasure in the realization that,
as the opponent of someone in whom he had momentarily seen a reincarnation
of Peltz, he put himself in Peltzís shoes.

Now Jacobson was looking forward to Pepijnís next move. But a week went
by and it hadnít come. And after ten days it still wasnít there. And that
in spite of the fact that it was a forced move; any novelties wouldnít
occur till later in the game.
Was Pepijn no longer looking forward to the next
move? Jacobson still could see the joy in the mouse-face when he had agreed
to the correspondence game. Suddenly he had the feeling that Pepijn had
taken this much time between moves all along. He took out his calendar
to check. The simul at Wilhelmus had been on October 28. It was now December
15óa month and a half for seven opening moves! Every one of which had been
in the paper.
Good grief.
He himself had always mailed his move on the next
day at the latest; Pepijn had done all the dawdling. Why? Did it have something
to do with the fact that Pepijn had no address but only a post office box
number? Was there some reason it took a long time for him to receive Jacobsonís
moves?
Or was Jacobson falling into the trap that threatened
every master who agreed to play a correspondence game against an amateur?
The thought had been with him all along. Frequently, the amateur had assistance,
strong assistance. Before you knew it, you were playing against an entire
club. At that point you had on the one hand a master who really didnít
feel like playing the game, and on the other some good amateurs who did
nothing but analyze the position. Jacobson wouldnít be the first to lose
such a game; world champions had gone before him.
Was Pepijn making him play against the Wilhelmus
chess club? Webster had said that there was no more chess club at the school.
Against a regular chess club? Was Pepijn getting advice from a strong chess
player he knew? By mail perhaps, which could be why it took so long? And
what did the Brisbane Bombshell have to do with thisówas Pepijn connected
with chess players who knew a refutation and was that why he was following
Feoktistov?
But whatever the reason, a twelve-year-old boy who
was allowed to play a correspondence game against a real master was definitely
expected to show some enthusiasm for that game.
Jacobson took a postcard and wrote: De Jong -
Jacobson: 0-1 (overstepped time). He cut the unused stamp off the self-addressed envelope,
threw away all Pepijnís drawings and forms that he still had, and mailed
his postcard.
He forgot about the correspondence game.

Peltz was a candidate for Sportsman of the Year. Enjoying the prospect
of feeling embarrassed when watching as prosaic a man as Peltz appearing
at something as pseudo-festive as the Sportsman of the Year show, Jacobson
turned his TV on. But Peltz didnít come; he was absent due to "personal
circumstances." He was chosen just the same, and now the show host announced
the scoop that Peltz was to have contributed: the city of Amsterdam was
a candidate for the organization of the Neishtadt-Peltz world chess championship
match.

Nine defensive sacrifices on one and the same square was something that
had never been achieved before, so what did it matter if the city was full
of sounds, and of people carrying bottles of wine on their way to one anotherís
places. But whenever the Bottomless Pit was finished, there was always
a dual solution too, and if Jacobson eliminated that, the mate would be
gone or it could be done in three moves instead of nineteen. It was as
if he was trying to write a perfect detective story and suddenly noticed
that the second chapter was about irrigation projects in Ethiopia. If he
scratched that, all the women in the story would be called Rodrigo, and
if he gave them their own names back, then the corpse would be alive on
the odd pages.
It was driving him crazy. And finally, Jacobson
didnít care anymore whether the Bottomless Pit would be beautiful, or whether
it would be appreciated; now it was only his will to create the Bottomless
Pit, against the Bottomless Pitís will not to be created at all.

Peltz came in fourth in a tournament in Spain, two points behind Feoktistov,
and also behind Katsnelson, a seventeen-year-old Latvian, and his own second
Loyd. The interesting thing was that with Black he had not played the Sicilian,
as if he wanted to avoid the question whether he still dared play the Bombshell.
Jacobson looked at Peltzís games with a certain
irritation. Frequently, players had a style that was the opposite of their
character: the dull ones would play wild, the wild ones dull. Peltz was
dull and played dull. All his games went to the park or to the beach; there
was never an emergency landing in the Azores. It made you wonder if he
was aware of the irony that he had achieved his greatest success with something
as uncharacteristic of him as the Brisbane Bombshell.

Was it because he momentarily couldnít think at all anymore?ósitting
in the chair at the dentist, Jacobson suddenly saw how the Bottomless Pit
had to be constructed. He knew that it would still take an enormous amount
of work, but from now on that would go automatically. Just like the Bottomless
Pit would be a machine that produced a mate in nineteen moves, so he would
be a machine that would at one point have produced the Bottomless Pit.
One evening he shifted a knightóand there it was:
the Bottomless Pit. It existed, it lived, it worked. In awe, and with a
lump in his throat, Jacobson stamped the umpteenth diagram, the last one.
One day, a chess researcher would find that diagram among his papers, and
it was for him that he wrote underneath: Mate in 19; "The Bottomless
Pit," Daniel Jacobson, hour, date, year. He got up from his table,
walked over to the window and, although he didnít like talking out loud
when he was alone, he said it: "The Bottomless Pit is finished."
Now he wasnít any longer the creator of the Bottomless
Pit, but the first person to actually see it. Pawn, pawn, pawn, knight,
knight, rook, rook, queen, bishop ... mate! Again and again: firework ignition,
clockwork precision.

The next morning, on the tram he took to go see Nardus, who had agreed
this one time to be shown the Bottomless Pit, Jacobson suddenly had a horrifying
thought: what if Black on his eleventh move didnít play rook to e4 but
rook to e3?
He felt sick.
Nardus was unable to help him: after rook e3 there
quite simply was no mate.
He was going to have to start from scratch.
"Come on, letís play blitz," said Nardus.

Almost two months after he had declared himself the winner, Jacobson
received another letter from Pepijn de Jong.

Dear Mr. Jacobson:I have to apologize for keeping you waiting such a long
time in between moves. But I have to go to the hospital from time to time,
and then Iím unable to answer you. In fact, I have just spent another month
in the hospital, otherwise would have wanted to write to you sooner. I
really hope you will continue playing me. In case you do, Iím sending you
my next move: 9.c4xd5 Iím really hoping the game can go
on. Pepijn de Jong

It was an altogether different letter from the ones before, an impersonal
computer printout without return envelope or drawings. What was it again
that he had written? Overstepped timeóJacobson wanted the ground
to open and swallow him up. Pepijn, in the hospital with tubes coming out
of his nose, his head one great white bandage, had been told that IM Jacobson
was no longer playing. He had been so happy with that game; chess was his
only pleasure in life.
Jacobson wrote back immediately. He apologized,
expressed his hope that Pepijn would be spared further hospital visits,
and made his countermove.
This time Pepijnís reply came within two days, and
after that the game continued at a normal pace. Just like Feoktistov had
done in Brisbane, Pepijn disregarded the drawing line; he continued on
the path that had led to Whiteís demise. He had to have an improvement,
or think he had one. It was now four months after Brisbane, and still no
one had published a refutation of the Bombshell. And yet, there almost
had to be oneó"Anyone still playing 8...d5 is naïve," a French magazine
had written. No one had dared to do it.
The overstepping of the time had left its mark.
Jacobson was no longer IM Jacobson, but Mr. Jacobson. The post office box
had been replaced by an ordinary address. There were no longer any surprise
gifts or return envelopes. Every time, Jacobson received the same spare
computer printout with the gameís notation and the new move added and underlined.
He had murdered Pepijnís spontaneity.

The Neishtadt-Peltz match was awarded to Amsterdam. At a press conference,
Peltz made a brief speech that, Jacobson decided after hearing three words,
might just as well have been given by the third secretary of the chess
federation. Not a word about the mincemeat Neishtadt would be made ofópropaganda
for the game of chess. Jacobson knew once and for all that it wasnít jealousy
that made him hope Japie Peltz would not become world champion. Chess was
too regal for the boy from the pet shop.

On his twelfth move, Pepijn played bishop e3. Feoktistov had castled
hereóthis was the long-awaited first move by Pepijn himself, his attempt
at refutation.
The envelope still in his hand, Jacobson felt disappointed.
Bishop e3 was a patzer move. He still remembered looking at it for a second
at the time, probably like everyone else, but Black just exchanges on e3
and White has an ugly weakness.
So here it was. He almost felt cheated now that
it was clear he had
not been cheated. He had indeed been wasting
his time on a schoolchild. The touching self-assurance of the boy: he
wasnít going to be fooled. Stupid Feoktistov, Pepijn had thought, why doesnít
he just play bishop e3?
Jacobson wrote his countermove on a postcard: bishop
takes bishop. But something told him he had to watch out. For the first
time in his game against Pepijn he set up the position on the board. If
there was something hidden in the Brisbane Bombshell, it was well hidden.
What he remembered about Pepijn from the simul was that he had studiously
avoided positional errors like bishop e3. If he wasnít careful, a game
Pepijn de Jong (12) vs. IM Jacobson might soon be publicized around the
world, a game in which the naïve master had played the Brisbane Bombshell
and been clobbered by a schoolboy who had found a sensational refutation.
And suddenly he saw it. If Black captured the bishop,
White would not recapture, but would win the black knight with a Zwischenschach.
And then all of Blackís pugnacious pieces would suddenly be ten years older
and he would simply be a pawn down.
How simple.
There it was, just like that, on the board at his
place, the move that the world had been looking for. If Feoktistov had
seen this, Peltz could have kissed his world championship match goodbye,
and if it became public knowledge, the Brisbane Bombshell would go down
in history not as a triumph of the imagination but rather as a holdup with
a toy gun.
He took the bishop: there was nothing better.
For two days Jacobson kept hoping that Pepijn would
recapture. In that case bishop e3 would be a fluke, and then Jacobson would
reveal that move, together with the Zwischenschach, to the worldóand he
would be the one who had refuted the Brisbane Bomb.
Pepijn didnít recapture; he gave the Zwischenschach.
How could it be that the miracle move turned up
in the game of a twelve-year-old boy who, as Jacobson had been able to
see for himself, was not good at chess?
In the correspondence game Pepijn de Jong - IM Jacobson,
Black was a pawn down without compensation.

The registration period for the World Composition Tournament expired
without Jacobson having been able to correct the Bottomless Pit.
That was a defeat, of course, but he was now becoming
more and more absorbed by his game against Pepijn. There was something
very strange about that game. He thoroughly understood the position and
set profound traps, but Pepijn wasnít falling into any of them and was
holding on to his advantage. OK, it was correspondence chess; the normal
differences in strength didnít count; diligence made up for the lack of
insightóbut would Pepijn be devoting even more time to the game than he
did?
He was reminded of a classical chess story. He knew
it from one of the first chess books he had ever possessed and had retold
it in one of his own.
Three chess masters are passengers on a ship: two
younger masters and an older one. The old master is losing all the blitz
games and is being laughed at. But, says he, that is because of the limited
time. His insight is greater, and if only he had more time, that would
show. Therefore he proposes a wager: in a simul against the two of them
he will score at least one point. One game with White, and one with Black,
blindfold.
He is laughed at even more loudly. A simul? And
blindfold? What nonsense. The wager is accepted, and the young masters
agree to sit in separate cabins so that they could not help each other.
Ship stewards deliver the moves.
Of course the old master makes the two younger ones
play against each other. No matter how it goes, he will score precisely
one point and win the wager.
Jacobson had always thought it a weak story. Why
did the young masters have to be in separate cabins? Only because for the
sake of the story they shouldnít be able to see each otherís positions.
But they would discover that they had been playing against each other right
after the games, so what did the old master gain by his deceit?
In blindfold chess it didnít make sense, but a correspondence
game was perfect for something like this. The cabins were houses, the stewards
mailmen, and in the middle sat, laughing, the old master: Pepijn.
Who was the unknown opponent? A suspicion,
almost too wild to think out loud, occurred to Jacobson.

When he had put his nineteenth move into the mailbox, Jacobson sniffed
the air: springtime. He was in an excellent mood; the move he had just
mailed was his response to his mysterious opponentís missed opportunity
to push his advantage to where it might become decisiveóhis first weak
moment.
Jacobson decided to go for a walk. At the entrance
to the zoo, he suddenly saw a girl whose face seemed familiar, and a second
later he noticed next to her Jaap Peltz and another, younger girl. They
were Bianca, Peltzís oldest daughter, and one of her sisters. That Bianca
was by no means so ugly anymore, although still awkward-looking. She had
to be about seventeen.
Peltz also noticed Jacobson.
"Hello, Daan," he said.
"Hey, hello, Jaap," said Jacobson.
They shook hands and became silent; they had never
been relaxed in each otherís company. The 1-0.
Jacobson shook hands with the girls too, and was
about to be on his way, but Peltz also seemed to be affected by the spring
air. "Are you free?" he said. "Weíre going to the zoo. Come on, join us."
A couple of times Jacobson saw heads turning toward
Peltz. Once he had to sign his autograph, which he did hurriedly, with
an apologetic gesture toward his daughters who werenít stopping.
At a kiosk, Jacobson, after asking Peltzís permission,
treated the girls to ice cream. He and Peltz also had some. Suddenly the
girls burst out in high-pitched laughter. Jacobson saw the reason: an elephant
had an erection, and a slimy thread trailed down from his huge member.
Jacobson felt greatly embarrassed having to see this in the company of
a father and two young girls, and he expected Peltz to lead his daughters
along in a hurry. But Peltz stuck around and joined in the laughter. He
seemed more at ease, more approachable than ever. Had success actually
changed him?
Peltz reminisced about Wilhelmus. They had been
there together for only one year, and they hadnít had many of the same
teachers. Suddenly Jacobson knew, with alarm, that he was going to say
what he had kept inside, ready and phrased, for at least twenty years.
They got to the sea lions just as they were being
fed. The animals were swimming by with tremendous tail strokes; Peltz let
himself get splashed, laughing. Jacobson followed the sea lion who had
done that and who now, willy nilly, played a role in the history of chess.
"Hey, Jaap," he said. "We never have much contact."
"No, thatís true."
"I mean the two of us specifically. It seems sometimes
we avoid looking at each other on purpose. Thatís not necessary."
"No, of course not," said Peltz. He nodded, embarrassed;
Jacobson realized that this conversation was just as difficult for him.
"Itís because of this one-zero. The game I won against
you that time. It still stands between us."
A smile appeared on Peltzís face, and he nodded
slowly. "Yes, maybe itís time I did something about that," he said.
"You want to know my fantasy?" Jacobson said, swept
along by the unprecedented intimacy. "Itís your last game against Neishtadt,
with the score still even, and you adjourn in a winning position, but heís
got a rambling rook. You know, that's what I call this rook that keeps
checking, and you can't take it on account of stalemate. I have mapped
that sort of thing out. And then you call me, and you win because I tell
you how you can get rid of that rook."
"This rambling rook doesn't happen that often in
practice," said Peltz. "But if it gets to that point Iíll certainly take
you up on your offer."

They were sitting by the water, opposite a group of motionless flamingos.
Peltz was telling an anecdote in which Bianca, one of his economics books,
and a headstrong teacher played important roles, but Jacobson was only
half listening.
In front of his eyes, a bishop was dancing on e3,
surrounded by jubilant little exclamation marks.
"Hey, that last game of yours against Feoktistov,"
he said when there was a lull in Peltzís story. He had to swallow hard,
and felt the eyes of the chess world upon him: no one else would get a
chance to discuss the Brisbane Bombshell with Peltz this casually.
"Yeah, yeah," said Peltz, laughing.
"What do you do if he plays 12. Be3?"
He saw a nervous glint in Peltzís eyes, but he immediately
regained his composure. Jacobson held his breath: he had touched something.
"Hey, Dad, you guys are not going to...," said Bianca.
"I just take on e3," said Peltz.
For a moment, Jacobson didnít know what to say.
Peltzís answer was ludicrous. Even insulting: at the level where you "just
took" on e3, bishop e3 was a patzer move.
"Queen a4 check," said Jacobson, and his heart was
pounding in his chest.
Peltz tried to remain serious, but couldnít, and
an awkward grin spread over his face.
"Jesus," said Bianca, "In that case I think Iíll
go pee."
"To the bathroom, sweetheart, you go right
ahead."
"Pawn gee seventeen eighteen," said Bianca, and
then she really got up and walked away, followed by the younger sister.
Peltz looked straight at Jacobson. "I see," he said,
and he nodded. "Good move. Where did you get it?"
"I saw it."
"How do you mean: saw it."
Jacobson had it on the tip of his tongue to say
that a twelve-year-old boy had played it against him in a correspondence
game.
"We lowly creatures see something once in a while."
"I thought you were only interested in chess problems
these days."
"Sometimes not."
"Are you going to publish that?"
"Are you going to play that?"
Peltz shrugged his shoulders. He had already recovered.
"They donít play d5 anymore, do they? I guess itíll show up in a correspondence
game or something like that."
They fell silent, looked at the silent flamingos.
The girls returned, their faces ready to look bored as soon as their father
started talking about chess again.
Peltz continued his story about the teacher, but
precisely because he was doing his best to make the conversation seem as
relaxed as before, you could sense that it was awkward now.
Bishop e3 had touched something.

On the way back Jacobson was besieged by breathtaking thoughts. So Peltz
also knew the refutation to the Brisbane Bombshell. That in itself was
not so amazing. It was natural that he had kept that knowledge to himself.
But now a twelve-year-old boy and the challenger of the world champion
were the only ones, as far as Jacobson was aware, who knew the secret of
12.Be3.
Did they know each other? Had Pepijn got
bishop e3 from Peltz?
And now Jacobson saw something that he had always
seen but that only now entered his mind. Pepijnís name was Pepijn de Jong.
Quintenís name was Quinten de Jong. Both De Jong, both close to bishop
e3. They even looked alike, if you knew.
Pepijn was the son of Peltzís manager.
Shivers ran down Jacobsonís spine. I guess itíll
show up in a correspondence game; maybe itís time I did something about
that 1-0... The mysterious opponent was Peltz. And Peltz knew
he was playing against Jacobson; he had invited him along to the zoo to
sound him out and see if he knew also.
He was using Pepijn to get evenóhe could not live
with their 1-0.

After he got home, Jacobson looked it up. Agency Quinten de Jong had
a post office box number he recognized: from Pepijnís letters written before
he had overstepped the time.
This must have been the scenario: Pepijn had started
playing the correspondence game himself. Perhaps he had asked Peltz for
advice one time, or else Quinten might have said somethingóin any case,
Peltz had heard about the game and had seen his chance to get even with
Jacobson. The long silence around the overstepped time must have related
to that: Pepijn had resisted when they were taking his game away from him.
But why had it taken two months before Peltz came up with the excuse of
Pepijnís hospital stay?
Jacobson checked old issues of his chess magazines.
Right after the tournament in Spain Peltz had been on tour in Africa. He
had returned on February 22nd.
It was late February when Jacobson had received
Pepijnís letter asking if he could please continue to play.

It was of course cheating on Peltzís part to have wanted to get even
in this manner, but Jacobsonís anger subsided quickly. This was actually
very beautiful. It wasnít only he who recognized in Peltz the central opponent
in his life; Peltz also saw in him a father he had to defeat at
least once.
For weeks on end Jacobson was on the verge of disaster,
but he fought, supported by the feeling that holding on to the 1-0 would
mean that, of the two of them, he was the true chess player. He analyzed
down to the deepest depths, wrote pages and pages full of notes. Never
before had he felt he understood a game this completely. And like a seriously
ill patient who slowly recovers, his position improved. He took advantage
of every small inaccuracy that even Peltz would commit, and as the summer
went by he got counterplay, he didnít have to lose anymore; a draw came
within reach. Sometimes he had the feeling that he was the one who
was cheating. Peltz had his family and the upcoming match against Neishtadt,
while Jacobson could devote himself completely to their game.
The Bottomless Pit was forgotten; at best he could
now shrug his shoulders over the fact that he had misled himself for such
a long time. That lofty struggle of the artist against his medium had been
a pretext, a self-imposed exile for failed chess players. Scavenger hunts
instead of voyages of discovery; the real chess was simply one-on-one,
a street fight with an uncertain outcome.
And what if this titanic battle was a metaphor for
his life? The opening was long past, and he had come out of it in a losing
position. But he had arched his back, he had fought, and everything was
possible once more.
He would not make the mistake of thinking there
was still a future for him as a tournament player, but why not as a correspondence
player? The normal differences in strength meant nothing there. Insight
against diligence; so what if he represented diligence? Diligence sprang
from loveóthat was precisely the beauty of it: in correspondence chess,
oneís love for the game was part of oneís strength.
He wrote to the Correspondence Chess Federation
for information about the proper channels one needed to follow to get a
shot at the world championship.
Once in a while he thought: Iím crazy. It isnít
Peltz at all. Iím putting all my soul into a game against a twelve-year-old
boy.
In early September Pepijn announced he would be
absent for two weeks. During those two weeks, Peltz held a brief training
camp with his seconds in Tunisia.

On his arrival in Amsterdam Neishtadt declared that he thought Peltz
was an interesting opponent and that it wouldnít surprise him if Semyon
Katsnelson would be his next challenger.
Because of another inaccuracy by Peltz one week
before the beginning of the match, Jacobson even got an edge. He wondered
how things should go from there. Peltzís situation was already having an
effect, and if Jacobson played on it might be taking advantage. Maybe Peltz
would let his seconds continue the game. That would do it injustice; it
had to remain a pure Peltz - Jacobson.
But winning was unimportant. To have battled Peltz
under even conditions and to have held on to his 1-0 was enough. Jacobson
decided he would make a gesture: he would offer a draw. In a way, a draw
was more honorable than a victory; a lesser god simply didnít beat Peltz
without creating the impression that Peltz hadnít really tried.

The opening ceremony of the match for the world championship between
Neishtadt and Peltz took place in the Muziektheater in Amsterdam.
Jacobson was one of only a few people to attend wearing black tie. He could
understand the way he was being looked at; he wouldnít have done it if
he had not planned his own ceremony there as well.
There was a ballet for sixteen dancers dressed in
white and sixteen in black; a choir sang a chess song composed for the
occasion. Jacobson kept a steady focus on Peltz, right next to Neishtadt
in the front row. So this was where life had taken Japie Peltz, who had
blundered a queen against him. Now, the prime minister, the Russian ambassador,
and the Queen had gathered to celebrate the coincidence that there were
a few connections in his brain that facilitated chess insight. None of
them had any idea that that same brain held a raging obsession with a blown
chess game for a school championship.
Jacobson felt pleasantly sentimental now that the
last minutes of the last, decisive game between Peltz and himself were
ticking by. It almost seemed that those dancers and singers were performing
for no one but Peltz and himself. What a splendid décor for the
big moment! Peltz would accept that the score between them would forever
be 1-0 for Jacobson, and at the same time he would accept that the
chess spirit had made the error of choosing Japie Peltz.
Peltz won the draw and chose White for the first
game.

In a space roped off with braided cords there was a reception for dignitaries,
chess officials, and other special guests. Jacobson observed, from his
side of the cord, the Queen being introduced to Neishtadt and his entourage.
A moment later she was standing among a group of people that included Peltz
and his wife and children. Once she burst into laughter; perhaps one of
the girls had said she thought chess was just a bore.
It was only after the Queen had left the reception
that Jacobson was able to get Peltzís attention.
They stood facing each other, separated by the cord.
Jacobson held out his hand, and Peltz, looking a bit surprised, shook it.
"Iím offering a draw," said Jacobson.
"A draw? What do you mean?"
"I donít think it is reasonable to play on." He
had to restrain himself to keep from saying: my position is better.
"What are you talking about."
"Our game."
Peltz looked at him glassy-eyed. "Our game? What
game?"
"Our correspondence game. I know that you are Pepijn.
I already sensed it before bishop e3, but I didnít dare believe it at the
time. You became Pepijn in February." But the way Peltz was looking at
him made the words harder and harder to get out.
"Pepijn who."
"Pepijn de Jong."
Peltz backed away. He shook his head and looked
at Jacobson as if he was afraid of him. There was a moment of silence.
"I can play queen c6 now," said Jacobson. "Iím better
then. But Iím offering a draw."
"There is some mistake here," said Peltz. He hesitated,
wanted to say something else, but then turned on his heels and walked away.
Jacobson stood by the cord, looking in his direction.
A couple of times, Peltz looked back as if to see if Jacobson was still
there, but as soon as he saw him he looked away.

At the agency of Quinten de Jong, he got the answering machine. Jacobson
called ten, twenty times, but each time the same lifeless voice answered.
On his chess board, with the position after 51...Qc6, the pieces stood
around as if there were no chess rules anymore. He couldnít bear being
in the house, went out, paced up and down the street, got an idea, ran
back to his telephone.

Webster asked if Peltz was going to be world champion.
"There is something I want to know about a student,"
said Jacobson.
"That all depends, it may be none of your business."
"Pepijn de Jong. He plays chess. He played in the
simul that time."
Even as he was talking he could hear Webster get
very quiet.
"Pepijn de Jong?"
"Yes."
"How close are you to the boy?"
"Not especially."
"Better grab a hold, all the same. Heís dead."
"Dead? Thatís impossible."
"I was at the funeral," said Webster. "Really awful."
Pepijn had died almost a year ago, on December 8.
Just after Saint Nicholas Day; just after the marzipan chess board that
had been his last move before the "overstepped time." Overstepped timeóhow
must that have struck the parents? The stamped self-addressed envelopes,
the drawings had ceased to come because Pepijn was dead. Someone else had
continued to play for him. But not Peltz.
Jacobson again called Quinten de Jong, and this
time he left a message.
A few minutes later he got a call back.

Paintings covered the walls, but all Jacobson could look at was a large
framed photograph of Pepijn, laughing, with a pawn in his arms at a giant
chess game in a park.
"Two weeks before his death," said Quinten. "At
that time we also took those Polaroids for you." He had continued
the correspondence game, and now he apologized. "Iíve gone too far. But
that way he was still a little bit alive. Thatís why I did it."
Pepijn had had leukemia; he always knew he would
not live to see twenty. He had been in seventh heaven with his correspondence
game against Jacobson, but during that same period his condition had rapidly
deteriorated; during the last weeks he had been in and out of the hospital.
Some time after his death, as he returned from a
trip with Peltz to Spain and Africa, Quinten had thought of continuing
the game for Pepijn. He had seen bishop e3 once when Peltz was analyzing
with Fajnman. Quinten had never asked Peltz for advice because he didnít
want him to notice that he had filched bishop e3, but especially because
he wanted to play for Pepijn all by himself.
"But sometimes I almost forgot him," said Quinten.
"Iíve spent entire days analyzing the game, Iíve passed up work for it.
It really was an exciting game, didnít you think?"
Jacobson nodded.
"At times Jaap would ask me what was the matter
with me that I was spending the whole day staring at a pocket chess set.
Said he couldnít use a manager who wasted his time on chess. Iím well aware
you guys think Iím a ridiculous patzer. But now I have shown you something.
And against a master like you!"
"Youíre a pretty decent player," said Jacobson.
"I could never have done it in a regular game, but
in a correspondence game things are different. Of course I started with
an advantage, because of bishop e3. I had good chances, but now I think
itís a draw. Iím offering a draw."
Whatís he talking about, thought Jacobson. He really
is a patzer. He doesnít even see how bad his position is.
But he felt that in this particular case it would
be inappropriate to refuse a draw. What the heck. He shook Quintenís extended
hand: draw.
Quinten made a funny noise and disappeared from
the room for at least five minutes.

"I have taken advantage of you," said Quinten. "After all, youíre a
professional. I figure you normally charge a fee for correspondence games
against amateurs. What do I owe you?"
Jacobson made a quick calculation. If he wanted
to get paid for what he had really put into this he could easily ask a
hundred guilders a move.
The game had lasted fifty-one moves, but the premature
draw had cost him a few moves. Fifty-one times fifteen... what if he were
bold and asked for fifteen hundred?
Once again he glanced at the photograph of Pepijn
holding the pawn in his arms; a little kid he had thought to use for an
errand boy. Pepijn was not a name you should have to die with when you
are twelve.
"Would two thousand guilders be OK?" asked Quinten.
Jacobson shook his head. "It was nothing, really,"
he said.
"Thank you," said Quinten. "Thatís quite a gesture."

They analyzed their game until early morning. Jacobson felt funny seeing
the pieces of his game in the hands of this odd customer of a ballet
dancer. But Quinten wasnít one of those annoying players who only want
to prove they were better all along, and he treated Jacobson with the respect
he deserved as a chess master. He deferred to his judgment, and when shown
some of the brilliancies Jacobson had seen, he said: "Wow, thatís beautiful!"
Of course, over the board he couldnít forever hide the fact that he was
after all an amateur, a beginner, a patzer. But that made only more admirable
how resilient he had been, how much he had seen for Pepijn.
For a patzer, Quinten had turned in a top performance.

Jacobson had fled the commotion of the press room and was sitting in
the dark hall peering at the stage where Peltz and Neishtadt were playing
their first game in the match for the world championship.
For Neishtadt, it was pretty near the hundredth
time, but Peltz, no matter that he was sitting on that podium for the very
first time, remained Peltz, insignificant and unmoved, someone who didnít
quite know how to deal with being the vessel into which had been poured
such a strange thing as chess talent. Playing chess was just something
he found he could do, the way someone else finds a pot of gold in his back
yard.
Maybe Japie Peltz would actually become world champion.
Jacobsonís thoughts wandered to his game against
Quinten. He had been crazy to accept a draw. He had had another look at
it: after queen c6 Black was practically winning. It also irritated him
that he had refused those two thousand guilders. An uncalled-for gestureóQuinten
paid his psychiatrist too, didnít he?
He should still try to get that money; after all,
he was a professional chess player.